The Empty Room

by Lauren B. Davis

  THE

  EMPTY

  ROOM

  LAUREN B. DAVIS

  Dedication

  For R.E.D.—if it weren’t for you, this wouldn’t be fiction

  Epigraph

  And the dreams that you have, alone in an empty room, waiting for the door that will open, the thing that is bound to happen …

  —JEAN RHYS, GOOD MORNING, MIDNIGHT

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  GOOD MORNING, WORLD

  SOGGY CROWS

  IT’S A KNOCK-OFF!

  YOU’RE A SMART GIRL

  A LUVERLY BUNCH OF COCONUTS

  AIN’T NOBODY WORRIED

  THE CENTRE OF IT ALL

  MAGIC FAIRY POTION

  MY PEOPLE

  SNOW GLEAMED WITH SILVER

  FLAILING, WINDMILL STYLE

  THE SOUL HUNGER

  A PRUDENT IDEA

  YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE BRUISES

  A WOMAN OF QUALITY

  COME AND GET IT!

  A DANGEROUS CURRENT

  JUST KEEP WALKING

  THE URBAN ANGEL

  YOU SEE WHAT THEY ARE

  MY WEE GIRL

  CLEVER SPARKLING FAKES

  WE’LL JUST LEAVE IT AT THAT,

  YOU AND I ARE A LOT ALIKE

  SAILING AWAY

  NOTHING LEFT TO WORRY ABOUT

  TIMING WAS EVERYTHING

  THEY DON’T CALL IT “SPIRITS”

  ACKNOWEDGEMENTS

  About the Author

  Praise

  ALSO BY LAUREN B. DAVIS

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  GOOD MORNING, WORLD

  It was Monday morning, and Colleen Kerrigan woke up wondering why she was chewing on a dirty old sock. She tried to pull her tongue from the roof of her mouth; it peeled away, dry and swollen. Her fingers told her she didn’t actually have a sock in there, which was something of a relief. She must have been sleeping with her mouth open, probably snoring like a wildebeest. The late-October sun butting up against the window barely made a dent in the murk. She rarely shut the curtains because her eighth-floor window looked out onto the parking lot and the old Dominion Coal and Wood silo. Besides, who wanted to peek into the windows of a nearly-fifty-year-old woman?

  The man’s voice on the radio said the high today would be seven degrees Celsius, with a brisk wind and the possibility of showers. His voice was sharp and irritatingly upbeat. She shut off the clock radio with a slap of her hand and dragged her legs over the side of the bed, her head fuzzy, her stomach churning. She had slept in her T-shirt and sweatpants, which she hadn’t intended. In fact, she didn’t exactly remember going to bed. She hadn’t even bothered to take off her bra and the wire must have dug into her left breast as she slept. It hurt. Or maybe it was cancer.

  Good morning, world.

  Her eyes settled on the framed postcard of Dylan Thomas’s writing shed at Laugharne, which she kept on the bedside table. The tiny room, the whitewashed walls, the simple desk and chair, the photos on the walls, the crumpled bits of paper, the bottle, the astonishing work Thomas created there … this was Colleen’s idea of perfection. If she concentrated on the image hard enough, it would manifest itself in her own life. She hadn’t written anything in a long time, but she would again, of this she was sure. Beside the photo lay the Bible. Many of the Psalms she knew by heart. They felt like a doorway—one of many, but one which suited her—into the world of Spirit she was sure lived just beyond her fingertips, just out of reach, but which nonetheless beckoned to her. The Bible was open now to Psalm 38. My wounds are loathsome and corrupt, Because of my foolishness.

  Sometimes the Divine had a wicked sense of humour.

  As she sat up, her head, and the room, spun. She held onto the bed for a moment until it righted. Was she coming down with something? Her sinuses were painful and her throat a bit sore. An ear infection, perhaps. That would account for the dizziness. Her tongue still felt woollen. Maybe she should just go back to bed and call in sick. But no, she’d taken too many sick days these past few months. She’d need a doctor’s note for any more. Her head ached and her bladder felt about to burst. She limped into the bathroom—her knee was bothering her again—and as she sat on the toilet she noticed new bruises on her legs and arms. Where had they come from? She must fight off the hounds of hell in her sleep. Maybe she sleepwalked? She reached for the toilet paper and her left elbow pinged sharply. She cupped it with her right hand. It was tender, just at the joint. When had she banged that? She was going to have to start taking better care of herself.

  When finished she made her way down the hall to the kitchen, where dishes crowded the sink and the yellow linoleum floor stuck to the soles of her feet. She drank club soda from the bottle in great gulps, hoping it would do its work and settle her stomach. The clock on the stove said it was nearly seven-thirty, which meant she had to rush or she’d never get to work on time. She had been late far too many times. On the counter, next to the hideous green cookie jar with the painted cherries—this had once been her mother’s—stood a vodka bottle. Colleen froze, the club soda bottle still pressed to her lips. Some of it dribbled down her chin and she wiped it away with the back of her hand. She stared at the vodka bottle. She picked it up and jiggled it, hoping it was merely an illusion, some trick of the light making it look nearly empty. It should be at least half full. But no, a mere inch or so sloshed about in the bottom. This simply wasn’t possible. She didn’t drink that much yesterday, surely. She must be losing her mind. She wondered if she’d miss it very much.

  She put down the bottle. Yes, she thought, I’ve rather enjoyed my mind. I will not drink today, she vowed.

  She remembered the bottle had been nearly full when she poured the first glass and added cranberry juice, sometime just past noon yesterday. She had munched some potato chips with that first drink, and had meant to pop a frozen macaroni and cheese into the microwave for dinner, but she never did. Vodka, chips, some peanuts … she had started watching Law & Order. Such a reliable show. No matter what time you turned on the television it seemed there was a Law & Order, in one of its many variations, on some channel or another. That Latino actor, so handsome; she could look at him all day. She remembered that, and something afterwards, some stupid confusing movie, and then she remembered picking up her guitar and singing … Joni Mitchell, soundtrack of her youth. And Tom Waits. Music filled up the space, drove away the silence of the empty rooms.

  She could not possibly have drunk all that vodka. But there it was, the near-neon accusation of it. She couldn’t go on like this, and she wouldn’t. She felt hollow inside, as scooped out as an old Halloween pumpkin. Hollow and jangled.

  A muffled buzzing came from somewhere in the vicinity of her living room. She put down the club soda. The telephone. Where had she left it? She had disconnected her land line six months ago, seeing no reason to pay for two phones. More economical, certainly, but the problem with a cell phone was that one was constantly misplacing it. Yes, there on the sofa. She picked it up and opened it. The readout said, “Spring Lake Place.”

  Oh for God’s sake, not now, she thought. She could just let it go, ignore it. But what if it was the call? “Hello?”

  “Is this Colleen Kerrigan?”

  Colleen walked back into the kitchen. She recognized Carol’s voice. Carol was the nice nurse and from her tone this was just one of those calls, not the call. “Hi, Carol.”

  “Your mother is here, Ms. Kerrigan, and she’d like to talk to you if you have a minute.”

  “Trouble?”

  “Well, she just wants to talk to you.”

  And Colleen knew what tha
t meant. She picked up the club soda bottle and took another swig. “Put her on.”

  Pause, and her mother’s voice in the background, the words unintelligible, only that awful, curt irritation.

  “Colleen?”

  “Hi, Mum. I don’t have much time. I have to go to work. How are you?”

  “Terrible.”

  Of course. Colleen couldn’t remember the last time her mother had given a positive answer to that question. Even before the mini-strokes she suffered last spring, which destroyed whatever remained of her impulse control and most of her memory and forced her move into Spring Lake Place, Colleen’s mother had to have been the most negative person on the planet.

  “What’s the matter?” It was an unwavering script.

  “It’s horrible here. This woman, she comes in and takes the … candles … potatoes … things and I’ve told her not to. I don’t want anyone in my room.”

  “I know, Mum, but she’s only taking your laundry.” The recurring laundry issue. Last week her mother had threatened to kill an aide over it—a threat that, with Mother, one couldn’t completely discount.

  “I don’t want them to take my things … my cake … the trolley …” The aphasia worsened when she was irritated. “Oh, I don’t know, I’m too tired. I don’t sleep.”

  If Colleen were to believe her mother, the woman hadn’t slept in thirty years. “Just let them take your dirty clothes. Isn’t it nice not to have to do your own washing anymore?”

  “I want to do my own cleaning. There’s nothing to do here. I hate it. I wish I was dead.”

  Don’t we all, thought Colleen, and she hated herself for it. “I know, Mum. I know it’s tough, but I’ll try to get you moved out of there soon.”

  “I’ll be dead by then.”

  Or I will be. “I have to go, Mum. I’m late for work. But I’ll talk to them, okay?”

  “That would be good, dear.”

  “I’ll talk to you later.”

  “It doesn’t matter; I don’t care,” her mother said, and hung up.

  Colleen flipped the phone closed and rubbed her temples, as though trying to rub the whole conversation away. Before her mother went into the nursing home, she hadn’t called Colleen in twenty years. Colleen always called her, dutifully, every two weeks, taking forty-five minutes to listen to her mother’s chatter, her complaints and the latest gossip from the seniors centre. It seemed much like the behaviour of high school girls, full of petty grudges and little betrayals. Grating as it was to listen to this, week in and week out, it was one of the few things Colleen could do for her mother, who was, after all, pretty much alone in the world. Husband dead, no siblings, and friends who didn’t seem to stick. Deirdre Kerrigan had long ago alienated most of her living acquaintances. Colleen had once thought her mother, like other mothers, might want to see more of her as she got older, but this was not the case. Her mother, after all, was not like other mothers. Deirdre rarely wanted to see her, and had claimed illness or fatigue or a dirty house as an excuse any time Colleen suggested they get together, which was, Colleen admitted, a relief to both of them. Christmases were a hell they had agreed to give up ten years ago, and which, after her mother’s last suicide attempt on Christmas Eve of that year, they never discussed. Last year Colleen sent her mother a large gift basket of expensive treats—chocolate, wine, biscuits, cheeses—picked especially to suit her palate. When Colleen called to wish her mother a Merry Christmas, nothing was said about the basket and so Colleen asked her if she’d received it.

  “I got it,” said Deirdre.

  A long pause followed. Colleen didn’t want to ask, knew she shouldn’t ask, but nonetheless asked, “Did you like it?”

  “It wasn’t what I wanted.”

  “What did you want?” Colleen asked, taken aback. Just when she thought she’d built fortifications against all her mother’s weapons, Deirdre pulled something new and sharp from her bag of tricks.

  “What does that matter now? This is what you sent, so thanks for that. Thanks a lot.”

  Her mother had sent her nothing. Deirdre Kerrigan’s mental state worsened when she was around her daughter for some reason—the depression, the suicide attempts, the obsessive thinking. It was hard to love a mother who fought so hard to keep her at arm’s length, but it was harder still to give up the idea that one day it might be different.

  Colleen put the cold club soda against her temple. God, it was so sad. What a non-life her mother had had, and this was the way it ended? Without even a little peace? Please God, don’t let that be me. O keep my soul, and deliver me: let me not be ashamed; for I put my trust in thee. She put the bottle back in the fridge, noting something fuzzy in the crisper that she was not up to dealing with at the moment. A stab of icy dread streaked along her spine. She could very well end up that way, couldn’t she? Or worse.

  Don’t think about it now. Only this: you will not drink today. Not today.

  SOGGY CROWS

  It was early evening, a time when she and her mother usually went downstairs with a bowl of barbecue potato chips to the TV room of the split-level house and watched The Man from U.N.C.L.E. or Daniel Boone, or sometimes Bewitched, which nine-year-old Colleen liked best. On that night, however, her mother watched Bonanza with steely indifference. She wasn’t sewing either, as she usually did, her hands busy hemming or putting on buttons or sometimes crocheting an afghan or a sweater. Instead, she clutched a tissue and held a glass of scotch, cradling it between her palms as though she were cold and it warmed her. Periodically she sipped from the glass and then snuffled loudly into the tissue. Now and then she seemed to stifle a moan. Tiny and dark haired, with a black sweater wrapped around her shoulders, she looked like one of the soggy crows perched on the branches of the oak tree outside their home in Burlington when it rained, glaring at Colleen’s window, as though she had no right to be warm and dry while they suffered so.

  Colleen sat at the far end of the couch and tried to concentrate on the television show, but need radiated off her mother in waves. Already in her pyjamas and pink terry-cloth robe, Colleen rolled the robe’s belt up tightly, let it out and then rolled it up again. She couldn’t leave, because then her mother would say she was deserting her.

  “So, that’s how it is,” her mother had said once, when Colleen, her throat thickening with shame even as she spoke, suggested her mother should be more easygoing, like her dad. Her mother’s eyes were hard with resolve, and pitiless. “Well, now I know where we stand,” she said, “and don’t think I’ll forget it.” She didn’t speak to Colleen for a week, and then only because Colleen broke down and cried so much she threw up.

  Colleen vowed she wouldn’t ever let her mother punish her that way again, which meant she had to keep her as happy as it was possible for the woman to be (which, even at nine, Colleen didn’t think was very happy at all), and right now that meant staying, watching her mother drink and cry and drink. Colleen felt herself drowning, her mother a dead weight dragging her under.

  Minutes ticked by, and then her mother finally said, “Your father is a shit, you know that?”

  Colleen pulled Pixie onto her lap from where she had been sleeping on the couch between them. She stroked the cocker spaniel’s long, silky ears and the dog sighed.

  “Of course, you’ve always liked your father better than me, haven’t you.”

  “No. I love you both.”

  Her mother sniggered. “Well, he’s drinking us into the poor-house, how about that for your wonderful father? And he’s got other women, too, did you know that? Little whore of a secretary.”

  “Mum, please …”

  Her mother blew her nose and threw the soiled tissue into a half-full basket by the end table. “What do you care? I might just as well turn drunk myself. Bottoms up!”

  As the pitch of her mother’s voice rose, Pixie’s head popped up. She hopped off the couch and moved to an armchair at the end of the room, Colleen’s father’s chair. Putting her chin on the armrest, she eyed them.


  “Even the damn dog!” said her mother. “Even the damn dog.”

  “It’ll be okay, Mum. You don’t have to be mad.”

  “If it wasn’t for you, I could have left long ago.” She blew her nose and pushed the wadded tissue into her pocket. She turned her gaze to Colleen. “Get away from me,” she said.

  And there it was. Now Colleen was expected to beg, to plead with her mother to love her: please don’t make me go away. Colleen recognized the look on her mother’s face—part defiance, part despair and part regret—although she was too young to have words for what she saw. She only knew her mother wanted her to play a familiar, terrible, hurtful game that Colleen never won, no matter how hard she tried.

  Not tonight. She got up and headed for the stairs. Pixie jumped down from the chair and followed.

  Her mother gasped. “Pixie! Get back there. Sit.”

  The dog obeyed, but looked so longingly at Colleen that she felt guilty for leaving her behind. She started up the stairs.

  “I see it now, Colleen Kerrigan. You’re your father’s daughter, aren’t you.”

  At the top of the stairs, Colleen stopped and tightened her belt, her stomach roiling. Her father sat in the dark in the living room, right in the middle of the good sofa where no one ever sat unless there was company. Colleen couldn’t make out his features in the dark. He was smoking and the blue-grey smoke was thick. Colleen walked toward him.

  “No, Colleen. Not now,” he said.

  She stood there on the carpet and felt something in the middle of her chest crink, like a sudden running-stitch in your side. Where was she supposed to go? Who was she supposed to go to?

  “Nobody wants me,” she wailed, although she hadn’t meant to.

  “Ah, Jesus,” her father said. “Come here, pet, come here.”

  She ran to her father, who smelled of cigarettes and scotch, and buried her face in his chest, letting out great wrenching sobs. “Everybody’s so mad all the time,” she said.